Do Certain Medications Boost Ketamine’s Effects? Here’s What We Know

Dr. Ben Yudkoff holds a sign for a Lumin Health Reddit AMA on r/Spravato by a sunlit window
Please note that throughout this blog, we may refer to ketamine, esketamine, and Spravato relatively interchangeably. This is due to the inherent similarities in chemical makeup between ketamine and esketamine, and their similar effects on mental health conditions. Don't hesitate to reach out to Lumin Health staff to ask any questions about treatment at hello@lumin.health or by scheduling a free consultation.

Dr. Ben Yudkoff, Co-Founder and Chief Medical Officer at Lumin Health, hosted a Reddit AMA on the Spravato community on November 21, 2025. The below blog post is a recap of one of the questions presented on that AMA, syndicated to the Lumin Health blog in the event that it answers any questions about ketamine therapy, Spravato treatment, or general concerns you may have about treatment. 

Read the full AMA on r/Spravato here 

Don’t hesitate to get in touch with us if you’re interested in learning more about ketamine for depression at Lumin Health. Thank you once again to the moderators and community members for facilitating such an engaging discussion.

BigCrow92 asks

Are there any medications that work better paired with Spravato / ketamine? 

Answer: 

As of right now, the research done into the efficacy of Spravato has been agnostic to the specific medication used alongside it. And so there is no evidence presently that suggests that one medication or another works better. The take-home here is that if a person uses a medication to help support recovery alongside Spravato. The medication should be targeted towards the symptoms someone has. People should check in to make sure that the side effects of the medications may not be augmented or compounded by Spravato. So for example, if someone is taking a medication that causes sedation, one would just want to be mindful that Spravato didn't double down on that side effect. Or if a medication caused heart rate elevations or blood pressure elevations, that Spravato may not double down on that particular side effect. But by and large, there are no specific medications that work better paired with Spravato per the evidence base.

There may be some medications and this is highly theoretical that help to work synergistically with ketamine and esketamine which is Spravato. Medications that promote the release of brain-derived neurotrophic factor such as fluoxetine or mirtazapine may — and again, this is highly theoretical — help support Spravato but nothing is so declarative that a person would choose a medication based on their intent to take Spravato. It's most important to find a medication that is the most tolerable and addresses best the symptoms that someone has. And Spravato, as per my experience, tends to play pretty well with most medications. The one caveat is you just want to make sure that side effects from one medication wouldn't be compounded by taking Spravato.

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Latest medical review on: June 8th, 2026. Medically reviewed by Instructor in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and Lumin Health Co-founder, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Ben Yudkoff.